Eloise Schoeman and Marnus Strydom Presents Light Years

'Light Years' is a duo exhibition featuring the works of fine art photographer Marnus Strydom and fine art painter Eloise Schoeman. The show encapsulates fleeting moments; moments you share with loved ones or strangers and personal moments that are a shared universal experience. They create their own realities in which they capture and hold a feeling long after it has passed. Both artists have found a commonality in their process. Strydom is an analogue photographer working with the intricate editing process of a negative and Schoeman uses digital photography as a basis for her paintings. They work with vivid colours and play around with intricate lighting to create a nostalgic feeling.

Marnus Strydom is a self-taught fine art photographer based in Johannesburg, South Africa. Known for his portraiture and experimental landscape work, Strydom uses analogue photography and cross-process development techniques, to distort reality and create an alternate universe in which he explores themes such as the current climate crisis, human nature and nostalgia.

Strydom cut his teeth in rural South Africa before relocating to Johannesburg in 2018. His Rural Gothic series caught the attention of the public with regular features in online publications such as Klyntji and Between 10 and 5, allowing the artist to make a move from the Eastern Cape Highlands to Johannesburg. He is currently working in the contemporary art industry.

Eloise Schoeman recently graduated as a fine art painter from the Tshwane University of Technology, where she studied under Dr Jan van der Merwe. For four years public transport was a huge part of Schoeman's life. She spent three hours almost every day on trains and busses. She would repetitively encounter many faces at the same time; countless brief moments where she would be sharing the same space with someone in close proximity, yet it was impersonal.

For several years she took photos of people in and around trains, busses, stations - in a vague attempt to document the people she was sharing a brief, mundane experience with. The act of commuting.

Due to social distancing as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, Schoeman started looking at the changes in public transport, the changes in commuters' body language, the newfound hyper-awareness of the surroundings of commuters and the change from crowded scenes to solitude and isolated moments.